MLB Execs Go to Jupiter to Get More Stupider

Is there a dumber way of determining the home field advantage of a play-in game than a coin flip? Either strength of schedule or head-to-head records would make a lot more sense. However I have a more innovative proposal. I suggest both teams do a water displacement test with their genitals. The 40 man roster with the greatest aggregate volume of manhood would get home field. At least it's a criteria of some sort, instead of dumb luck.

Cashman Returns

Thank goodness. Brian Cashman will remain the Yankees GM through 2011. This is more than a mere formality, as I feared that he would consider fleeing the Bronx pressure cooker for a more relaxed rebuilding gig (perhaps Washington or Seattle). Despite holding his position for 11 seasons, Cashman is arguably the sport's most difficult general manager to fairly evaluate. Other parties within the Yankee organization have been so influential in baseball operations that it is nearly impossible to determine who was responsible for any given transaction.

Count me among those who give Cashman the benefit of the doubt. Wrestling fans would refer to me as a Cashman "mark". In the absense of inside information, I assume Cashman deserves credit for every smart move and assign blame to the Tampa faction for every poor organizational decision. Yes, this is foolish. But until proven otherwise, I remain a true believer.

A Victim of Base 10

The case against Mike Mussina's Hall of Fame candidacy has primarily boiled down to an irrational fascination with round numbers in base 10 mathematics. Until Sunday, Mussina had never won 20 games. That wins are dopey statistic to use to judge a pitcher is an argument for another day. Since his lack of 20 win seasons is (or was) the knock on Mike Mussina, I'll pretend for a moment that wins are the be-all and end-all of a pitcher's value. I will also, for the sake of this argument, subscribe to the ridiculous notion that all benchmark numbers must begin with a non-zero digit, followed by a succession of zeros. I'll make believe that 20 win seasons, 300 career wins, 100 RBI seasons, 500 career home runs, 200 hit seasons, and 3,000 career hits are the only stats with which the Hall of Fame voter should concern himself.

I make all of these concessions to convential wisdom and all I ask in return is that you analyze Mussina's counting stats in base 9. Humanity's use of base 10 mathematics (ten digits in our numeral system) is probably a function of the fact that most people have ten fingers. Therefore it was the most convenient method of counting for our ancestors. Had Antonio Alfonseca been the first man to gain knowledge of mathematics, we would use base 12. Were it Mordecai Brown who made the discovery, 8 would be our base of choice. Incredibly, the fact that we have ten fingers threatens to keep a Moose head from enshrinement in Cooperstown.

It so happens that 20 in base 9 is equal to 18 in base 10. Let us look then at how many 20 win seasons Mussina has had in base 9.

• 1992- Base 9 wins: 20 (Base 10 wins: 18)


• 1995- Base 9 wins: 21 (Base 10 wins: 19)


• 1996- Base 9 wins: 21 (Base 10 wins: 19)


• 1999- Base 9 wins: 20 (Base 10 wins: 18)


• 2002-Base 9 wins: 20 (Base 10 wins: 18)


• 2008-Base 9 wins: 22 (Base 10 wins: 20)

Moose has six 20 win seasons in base 9.

By way of comparison, here is a non-comprehensive* list of Hall of Fame pitchers with fewer 20 win seasons in base 9 than Mike Mussina.

• Sandy Koufax, Whitey Ford, Lefty Gomez, and Jim Bunning all have five 20 win seasons in base 9.



• Don Drysdale, Nolan Ryan, Don Sutton, and Phil Niekro are four time 20 game winners in base 9.

Sandy Koufax, Whitey Ford, and Nolan Ryan. A Hall of Fame without any of these men is a complete farce. One without Mussina would be one as well.

(*Laziness prevents me from researching Hall of Famers inducted prior to 1972. And poor observational skills might have caused me to overlook some players elected after that date.)

What Went Wrong: The Unpredictable

Nobody could have predicted the following problems:

• The Mets abominable performance in the clutch: Let me start by saying that I do not put much stock in the idea that certain players are inherently good or bad in "clutch" situations. This, mostly imagined, personality trait. Performance in big spots, both individual and organization-wide, can fluctuate wildly from year to year. I'll conservatively guesstimate that such variations are 75 percent luck. That said, the Mets were remarkly unlucky in important situations this season.
• The main piece in Minaya's horrendous Millidge trade, Ryan Church started the season brilliantly, making his acquisition looking slightly less ill-advised. Then a couple of concussions turned him into New York's most high profile mush head since Wayne Chrebet. He missed much of the season and never returned to his April form, when he did play.

Some time tomorrow, I will address the bullpen.

What Went Wrong: The Predictable

I'll break down the Mets' failure into three parts; the predictable, the unpredictable, and the bullpen (which doesn't fit perfectly into either of the former categories). I start with the predictable. These are the flaws in the team's design that were foreseeable last offseason.

• The continued physical breakdowns of Moises Alou, Pedro Martinez, and El Duque: Old, injury-prone players never get younger and healthier. To be fair, I was all for resigning Moises Alou. He was the '57 Chevy that looked awesome around town but spent a lot of time in the shop. This was the year the engine completely crapped out. Disappointing for the Met fan, but certainly not shocking.
  
• The unreliability of their 2nd thru 5th starters: After Johan, this is how the rotation looked going into this season. Pedro hadn't been healthy since 2005. We already vintage Pedro was long gone. El Duque is well into his seventies and had alternated between injury and mediocrity for years. Ollie had been awful in 2.5 of the previous three seasons. Maine had been maddeningly inconsistent, particularly down the stretch last season. Pelfrey appeared to be a semi-bust in his Major League stints, coming into the season.


• The general lack of production out of second base and catcher: The Luis Castillo signing was perhaps the most inexcusable transaction of Omar Minaya's Met career. When completely healthy, he has been your bog-standard second baseman.* So Omar locks him up for four years on the downside of his career, as his gams rapidly become more suited for murderball than baseball. Brian Schneider simply should not be a starter in the Major Leagues. He can't hit a lick and he is only average defensively. Perhaps he had a reputation as a good handler of a pitching staff, but the Expos/Nats pitchers hadn't had a whole lot of success over the course of his career.

The blame for these problems fall directly on Omar Minaya's shoulders.

(*I'm an anglophilic douche. Bog-standard is a British phrase I nicked from a Ricky Gervais podcast. It means "run of the mill")

Timing is Nothing

The advent of this blog has all the timing of a Herm Edwards offense in a two-minute drill.* My focus is New York baseball and neither the Yankees or Mets will play another game for more than six months. I'm a week late to write my lukewarm ode to Yankee Stadium and another good riddance to Shea would just be overkill. Since the Yanks have been dead since August, the only topical issue to discuss is the Mets second consecutive collapse.

Full disclosure: I am a Yankee fan, who despises the Mets nearly as much as I love my own team. Nothing made me happier than seeing Met after bassless-voiced Met (Elias is reporting that no team since the '44 St. Louis Browns has had a greater collection of players with pre-pubescent voices) try to explain this one to the beat writers in the postgame show.** However I feel that I have a great ability to put aside my hatred for the club and fairly analyze the club.

Later tonight I will offer my thoughts on what happened to them. But first a few things that were not part of the problem:

• Team chemistry
• Lack of leadership
• A bunch of choke artists
• Bad karma

These sorts of non-explanations are almost always a cop-out for lazy analysts.

(* Good job Tremont! Your first reference on a NY baseball blog, is the Kansas City Chiefs head coach

** That clunker of a sentence couldn't fit comfortably in the backseat of a Town Car)

Prologue

It is tiresome cliche that sports bloggers are overweight failures, who live in their mother's basements. I have frequently found such characterizations misleading. However in my case, they are only off by two floors.

Does this mean my opinions should be taken less seriously? I don't think so. Judge me not on my place of residence, but on the weakness of my arguments and the shakiness of my sentence structure. Surely this post would have been equally as insipid, had it been written from a penthouse overlooking Central Park, instead of the spare bedroom in my parent's house.

This blog's primary aim is to cover New York baseball, in a manner both irreverent and sabermetrically savvy. It will contain the odd bit of foul language and deliberately offensive material. Other sports, pop culture, politics, and general observations are all on the table as well. Feel free to skip any posts you don't like, but I really have no interest in engaging in discussions with people who tell me to "stick to the sports".

Enjoy.